A centre of excellence for subsea research and technology development, has been officially opened in Dyce, Aberdeen.
The National Subsea Centre was established to provide advanced research to accelerate the transition to net zero.
It will be delivered through a partnership between Robert Gordon University (RGU) and Net Zero Technology Centre (NZTC), as part of the Aberdeen City Region Deal (ACRD).
The NSC focuses on three strategic research programmes: Transparent Ocean, Integrated Energy and Marine Operations.
Each programme is delivered through interdisciplinary research projects in the fields of subsea engineering, artificial intelligence, data science, and integrated energy.
The centre explores the new technology needed by the energy industry to meet challenges of reduced emissions from operations, cost-effective and resilient power grids and the need to develop a highly skilled digital workforce.
The NSC is currently working with NZTC on a number of innovative projects, including the ‘SeaSense’ project which will develop technology that allows Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROV) to function in harsh, visually compromised environments.
The two centres are also collaborating on the NZTC’s Data for Net Zero (D4NZ) project which will deliver the world’s first Smart Energy Basin by utilising an integrated suite of data science, visualisation and modelling tools.
NSC director Professor John McCall said: “We’re delighted to have welcomed our partners and key stakeholders to the official inauguration of the centre today to showcase the hugely impactful research our teams are doing.
“We already have an embedded culture of enthusiasm and curiosity at the centre, and we use this to drive the development of smart digital and engineering technologies to enable a faster, more cost-effective and sustainable transition to a net zero energy basin, both locally in the North Sea, and globally in other offshore energy environments.”